Monday, October 03, 2011

F.Percy Smith

If you have half an hour to spare, there's a lovely BBC Radio 4 iplayer programme about F. Percy Smith called The Balancing Bluebottle.  I've mentioned him before in relation to the Watch Me Move show at the Barbican, where Birth of Flower (1910) was exhibited. The fantastic BFI archive has a few of his films online as well, this spidery one (using a mechanical fly) is really fantastic.  Percy Smith aims to "administer the powder of instruction within the jam of entertainment."  What a brilliant fellow he was, and a little bit eccentric too.



2 comments:

Hazel Terry said...

I took the time to watch the balancing Bluebottle X did you really post this at 3am?

Lizzy Hobbs said...

No definately not Hazel, although it gives a very industrious impression dosn't it?